Le Mariage de la Vierge

Robert Campin painted this in the 1420s, at the very start of what we now call Early Netherlandish painting, when artists in the Low Countries first began packing religious scenes with everyday detail. The story is the betrothal of Mary and Joseph, but look at the buildings. On the left stands an older, round-arched Romanesque structure, where an earlier scene from Mary's life takes place. On the right, Joseph and Mary join hands before a Gothic portal that is still unfinished, its stonework fresh. Campin is using architecture as an argument. The old rounded style stands for the Old Testament, the new pointed one for the New, and the marriage happens on the threshold between them. Even the stained glass overhead shows scenes from the Hebrew Bible.